Soundtrack of Your Life: Groceries

An occasional feature in which we mark the songs of our relative youth as played over public muzak systems. 

Date: 31August 2014, 12:50 p.m.
Place: Sprouts market
Song:  "Someday Someway"
Artist: Marshall Crenshaw
Irony Matrix: 4 out of 10
Comment: I took note about a week ago that earlier this month both Elvis Costello and Joe Jackson turned 60. Those new-wave nerds. Those angry post-punks. They came from musical families and had higher ambitions than just selling snappy 45s. Sixty, now, with less of a sneer. It gives a man pause, especially if he went to high school in the late '70s and college in the early '80s, because he's only a life cycle or so behind.

Marshall Crenshaw (born November 1953 ... age 60) crafted pure pop for what would become the alternative music scene. His songs were sugary and infectious. He played John Lennon on Broadway. He more recently was the young buck in the reconstituted MC5. He has a killer record collection and spins songs on WFUV in New York.

His first hit played at the grocery store today. Halfway through it was interrupted by "Sabrina, please come to the front entrance. Sabrina to the front entrance." And then the song finished. Then I found coconut oil on sale. What more could I have hoped for?

Check out the baggy pants:

Tres Hombres

Three larger-than-life figures out in the wild West:

ROAD TO PALOMA (C+) - Can a movie be worth it for its soundtrack? Because this buddy road flick across the California desert is essentially one long string of movie cliches, albeit a fairly entertaining one. And the music, led by husband-wife stompers Shovels & Rope is raw and compelling throughout, as if it were an additional character.

Hulky Jason Momoa ("Game of Thrones") is Wolf, a brooding native American who hits the road after exacting revenge on the man who killed his mother. He meets up with musician and drunk Cash (Robert Homer Mollohan) with a couple of federal agents on their tails. There is nothing here you haven't seen in other films -- a bareknuckled fistfight on a dusty Indian reservation, a wisecracking agent paired with a sadistic one, and borderline Indian stereotypes (with Wes Studi there to try to overcome them). This is a bizarre cross between -- stick with me here -- "Billy Jack," "Easy Rider," "True Detective" "Angel Heart" and "Red Shoes Diary."

I'll admit that the deciding factor for seeing this was the opportunity to glimpse Lisa Bonet for the first time in a while. She is married to Momoa, and they have two kids, and their several scenes together as reunited lovers come off as vanity noodling, with embarrassing improv moments tossed in. You have to wonder why they would want us to watch them make love in a tastefully lighted trailer; it's like a boring sex tape spliced into the middle of the film. (Lisa, by the way, in her dreads and cowboy boots, looks lovely.)

Yet ... this movie stuck with me. Momoa makes his directing debut, as does cinematographer Brian Andrew Mendoza, and while they overdo the soft-focus nature shots, they manage to find genuine grit and beauty in that California desert. The result is borderline amateurish, but their hearts are in this, and I was reeled in until the end.

The soundtrack is available for download at Tunes and on disc at CDBaby. It also includes contributions from Griffin Young, Radio Birds, the Treasures, Molly Gunner and Diamond Light. Here's the song that plays over the credits. It's by Mackenzie DeWolfe Howe, "When I Go":




SPARK: A BURNING MAN STORY (C) - Disappointingly, this documentary is more about the process of putting on the annual dropout spectacle in the Nevada desert than it is about the event itself. And that means it's about a bunch of grey-haired hippies clinging to the idea of a counterculture movement that sold out long ago. (Not a bad encapsulation of the entire Boomer life experience over the past 50 years.) Or, worse, its a bunch of scenes of performance artists whining about how difficult their work is and how impossible their deadlines are. Ugh.

Who would want to watch the production crew sit around a table and brainstorm? The talking heads are not very interesting, except for the crotchety set supervisor who goes by the name Otto Von Danger. The questions of whether the founders have sold out get glossed over. When the movie finally gets around to showing some scenes from Burning Man we get the most banal, PG images you can imagine. Is that all there is?

Sometime mid 1990s, I vividly recall reading a Spin magazine centerpiece about the event and was smitten. By then in my early 30s and between marriages, I ached to be the type of bon vivant who would go off and disappear in the desert for a week and commune with next-gen hippies. It's one of the what-ifs of my life. A friend went a couple of years ago and was quite underwhelmed. Would things have been different 20 years ago? This movie doesn't begin to provide a hint.

A NIGHT IN OLD MEXICO (D+) - Let's hope Robert Duvall (age 83) makes another movie before he retires; it would be a shame if this clunker were his swan song. It's a dull tale of an old codger getting kicked off his land and, after a surprise visit from his grandson, goes on a bender across the border.

This is what Disney might have come up with in the late '60s if the censors would let them include a hooker with a heart of gold. (Here, poor Angie Cepeda gets the short straw, saddled with the name Patty Wafers for good measure.) Unmemorable 20-something Jeremy Irvine plays the apple-cheeked grandson, the offspring of Red's ne'er-do-well kid Jimmy.

Would you believe that, on the way to Mexico, ol' Red and wide-eyed Gally pick up a couple of hitchhikers, then ditch them, only to find some drug stash still in the backseat? And would you believe that them fellers are after Red and Gally for the rest of the movie? And would you believe that sweet Patty Wafers takes a might shine to ol' Red? No, I wouldn't believe any of that, either.

The cinematography is inordinately bright and crisp for a nocturnal foray into an underworld south of the border, a major indication that the production team was tone deaf all around. Duvall mumbles and grumbles and hams it up until you feel bad for him. I don't know why I didn't shut it off, but instead it just droned on to its inevitable happy ending.

BONUS TRACK
One more from "Paloma" -- this is Shovels & Rope with "Hell's Bells":

 

New to the Queue

These are the dog days ...

The quirky tale of the leader of a band (Michael Fassbender) who wears a large papier-mache head, "Frank."

As you know, we automatically add Michael Winterbottom/Steve Coogan films to the queue; this one is a follow-up to the comic food escapade with Rob Brydon, "The Trip to Italy."

Catherine Breillat uses Isabelle Huppert as her stand-in in the autobiographical "Abuse of Weakness."

Reluctantly, we give Phillipe Garrel (and his actor son) another chance (after "A Burning Hot Summer"), in the relationship film "Jealousy."

A tale of love and separate apartments, John Lithgow and Alfred Molina in "Love Is Strange."

A couple of foul-mouthed sisters behaving badly in "See You Next Tuesday."

A gimmicky story, but starring Elizabeth Moss and Mark Duplass, "The One I Love."

A British father-son prison film, perhaps recalling "A Prophet," David Mackenzie's "Starred Up."

Kids today: Part 4

A would-be masterpiece. And yet ...

BOYHOOD (B+) - As has been hinted at all week, I've never been a parent. If I were, this movie might have bowled me over. As it is, it's a well-wrought drama about a narrow aspect of growing up and growing old, created with a clever production trick.

As gimmicks go, "Boyhood" is as impressive as you can get. Shooting over the course of 12 years with the same actors, Richard Linklater (whom we have watched gradually mature from "Dazed & Confused" and "Slacker" through "Before Midnight") chronicles the life of a boy (and his family) from kindergarten to the brink of college. And if the gimmick weren't so noticeable, this could have been a great film for the ages.

Ellar Coltrane is perfectly bland as Mason, our all-American boy from Texas, because he's the constant in this experiment. It's the events that occur and the people around him (family and friends) that flesh out this narrative -- his divorced parents, Olivia (a shaky Patricia Arquette) and recovering deadbeat dad Mason Sr. (Linlater favorite Ethan Hawke, rescuing the movie time and again); his sister, Samantha (Linklater's daughter Lorelei, who steals early scenes and then mostly disappears in the second half); and Mason's various stepfathers (a pair of stereotypical drunks) and step-siblings (mirror-image ciphers). Olivia moves the kids around as she fails at more marriages, earns a degree and starts climbing the academic ladder. (They bounce from Austin to Houston to San Marcos, but even though they're pretty poor they somehow don't live around any people of color.) It's interesting that Linklater titles the film "Boyhood," because the film is really mostly about him and his 50-something perspective on the world and the past; it easily could have worked as "Parenthood" or "Childhood" (Samantha's experiences are just as significant) or "Adulthood."

The cast is mostly able. Those stepfathers (Marco Perella and Brad Hawkins) are thankless roles, alternately bitter and brooding, either smashing whiskey glasses or kicking over empties, and a scene of domestic violence is poorly sketched out and resolved. The girlfriends (Zoe Graham and Jessi Mechler) offer personalities that tend to challenge Mason's in interesting ways. Arquette searches for depth in Olivia, the practical mom, and mostly finds it. When she breaks down while watching her baby pack up for college, you feel with her that ache of impending irrelevance and the flash before her eyes of all the missteps she has made despite having, despite the odds, produced an able young man heading into the world.

Linklater insists on creating improv exercises for his actors, and the results are mixed. Hawke, from the "Before" trilogy, can do this in his sleep, and though he borders on overly mannered at times, his winking, casual style lends authenticity and gravitas to the proceedings. (I especially liked the way he tried to explain to the boy the transcendence of a Wilco song on the car stereo without sounding like a geezer.) Lorelei Linklater shows promise (like the Apatow girls, earning her spot on the roster) and great skill, but then she is marginalized. (She reportedly asked her dad to kill off Samantha.)

We truly realize the limitations of the patchy script and the cast's passable ad-lib skills when a trio of top-notch journeymen character actors turn up to show how it's really done. Tom McTigue delivers an epic wake-up speech to our 11th-grader as his photography teacher. Richard Robichaux has an Alan Cumming charm and wit as Mason's manic fast-food boss, who seems to ingratiate himself into the kid's inner circle at his graduation party. And Linklater veteran Bill Wise gets in a few late licks while stealing the graduation-party scene as Mason Sr.'s brother, wise-cracking Uncle Steve. The electric jolt that those actors provide is yet another unfortunate reminder that this production was a decade-long slog and that not everyone was up to the task.

Those three men join the chorus of others who are regularly imparting fatherly advice to Mason throughout the years. It's a clever common-man theme to weave throughout the story (along with a satisfying running gag about wearing seat belts). But here, again, the characters merely seem to be standing in for Linklater and his view of a young man's role in it. If you want to make the movie "Fatherhood," go right ahead, Richard.

Mason's male friends are either nonexistent for much of the movie or thinly constructed, with no more depth than Gilbert on "Leave It to Beaver." No matter how well Mason does with the girls -- and the two most prominent ones are improbably beautiful; again, you can essentially see Linklater doting on the casting sessions -- the overwhelming amount of time for a kid like that is spent with his buddies, and to gloss over that time of male development seems to miss one of the essential parts of "boyhood." When Linklater seeks to hit a climax with a male-bonding moment featuring one of Mason Sr.'s old music pals (played by Austin legend Charlie Sexton), the foundation is insufficient for a genuine payoff. (And we won't belabor another valid concern: adolescent boys just aren't that interesting to watch.)

And then there's that gimmick, the elephant in the room. Especially in the first half of the film (which is about the length of a full regular indie feature) Linklater can't help himself in advertising his neat little sleight of hand. He ham-handedly marks the passage of time with the music or technology of that year, as if we wouldn't just notice the kid's voice deepening or facial hair growing in. The use of those glaringly obvious pop-culture markers (starting with a comforting Coldplay classic) might have been a good idea while shooting the film, but to then edit the material and choose to play them so prominently (or perhaps even go back and add them in) is to invite eye-rolling.

Some of those tricks are, admittedly, kind of neat. Linklater apparently shoots real time at an actual Houston Astros game, with Hawke and the kids cheering from the box seats -- but again, that tends to take you out of the narrative when you start to think, "Oh, cool, he's really shooting at an actual Astros game. Did he really luck out with a walk-off home run? Nice touch." (And, of course, he's not doing anything that Jim McBride didn't do in 1967 with "David Holzman's Diary.")

Which isn't to say that this isn't a powerful film with an epic dramatic sweep and the familiarity of family ties. My eyes were slightly misty for most of the last hour or so, and I can't say exactly why. (You be quiet, biological clock.) I choked up at some of the oddest scenes. For instance, Olivia deals with a small-time local contractor about a busted sewer pipe in her side yard, and after he explains, in a heavily Spanish accent, that replacing the whole thing is the wisest course, she agrees and then tells him that he is smart and that he should take classes at the community college. Linklater, unfortunately, ruins that moment when, toward the end of the film, he stuff in a surprisingly sappy reprise in which the young man runs into Olivia (and the kids) and thanks her for inspiring him to go to school. (That scene is also one of at least a dozen false endings that grow increasingly frustrating in that final half hour.)

As noted, this was a dramatic experiment, or perhaps a series of them. And like all experiments, some parts work and some don't. (You shouldn't get extra points merely for having a clever idea; the final product must stand on its own.) As a friend notes, the film reminds us that life is rarely very exciting, and childhood can seem to zoom by -- at least from a nostalgic parent's perspective -- in the blink of an eye (or, say, 165 minutes). It's easy to commiserate with many of the characters (at least for us white folks, it is).

Richard Linklater is a contemporary of mine. He went off and made movies and had children; I didn't. He stayed near his roots in Texas; I ditched mine and leapfrogged him into the Southwest. Because this movie is about him (and my alternate-universe twin) and not about some random boy, maybe I expected more than just a trompe l'oeil quick-flip through a family's photo album.

I won't go so far as to call this film manipulative or mawkish. Sure, there's nothing new about a director getting middle-aged folks to sigh, laugh, cry or cheer in recognition of the agony and delights of raising a child to adulthood; the Hallmark Channel makes its money off of scenes like that every day. (They're called Hallmark moments.) Such tricks of the trade do not result in great cinema, as much as we wish that they would.

Kids today: Part 3

WE ARE THE BEST! (A) - This is the first time all year that I hated for a movie to come to an end. I was lost in its world. When was the last time a film felt too short?

Lukas Moodysson ("Together," "Lilya 4-Ever") offers up a uniquely quirky story: It is Stockholm in 1982, and three Swedish early-teen girls -- outcasts among their classmates -- come together to form a ragtag punk rock group. Rarely will you find a more winning depiction of both the exhilaration and the heartache of growing up.

When we first see the androgynous pair Bobo (Mira Barkhammar) and Klara (Mira Grosin), they are trying to educate a couple of classmates (more girly girls) about the hazards of nuclear power. Outspoken Klara wears a Mohawk spike and a Billy Idol sneer. Bobo, with short kinky hair, broods behind a pair of Lennon specs, and she defers to her alpha-female pal. At home, the girls are gloomy; ignored by the adults, they burrow into their bedrooms, connected to the outside world through headphones that blast angry, political music and connected to each other by old-fashioned land lines.

Back in the school environment, the girls are scoffed at, while a bunch of metal-head boys in the band Iron Fist are admired and promoted by the music teachers. When the clever girls notice that Iron Fist forgot to sign up for its studio rehearsal time, the girls take over the space, despite the fact that they have zero musical knowledge. (The rivalry between the bands will provide the movie's climax and its title.) There are a set of drums and a bass lying around, so the girls start experimenting.

Moodysson somehow captures the very essence of the DIY ethic promulgated by the original punk movement of the '70s. We watch the girls pick up that bass (Klara, being bossy) and settle down behind the the drumkit (Bobo, resigned) and just bang and twang aimlessly (and cocaphonously). But no matter how tuneless their clanging is, they feel the thrill of discovery and manage to find the kernals of their first song -- "Hate the Sport," a screed about the shallowness of rabid fandom in a suffering world. And that was the ethos of the era -- pick up some instruments, any instruments, create a clatter and scream your grievances.

Later, at a school concert, they watch Hedvig (tall, blonde Liv LeMoyne) masterfully play classical-based guitar. Hedvig, too, is an outsider, and Bobo and Klara invite her into their world and into the band. Hedvig teaches them some actual chords and structure; they rudely repay her by forcefully hacking off her hair to boy-short length.

Bobo, the chronic second banana in her friendship with Klara, will meekly and politely air her own personal grievances to Klara about being denied the bass gig and about the general imbalance of their relationship. Klara will remain mostly clueless. Enter a boy.

Once again, like our last entry, we find ourselves deep in a coming-of-age story. Here, the love troubles are not blown out of proportion, but rather are used expertly to deepen our understanding of Bobo and her struggles in that transition to adulthood. (Klara, the foul-mouthed provocateur and virulent atheist, already seems like an adult.) Bobo discovers another cool band and contacts its leader, Elis, and arranges a meeting of the band members. As they awkwardly hang out with the older boys, Klara (with big bright eyes and pouty lips) wins  the affection of Elis, ignoring Gal Code and her devotion to Bobo.

Bobo will later get revenge on Klara (who naively thinks that she and Elis are dating, even though he never followed up their meeting with a phone call or text) by sneaking off to meet Elis. She doffs her glasses on the train and dabs on a little makeup. We can tell that she's not being herself -- and she knows it, too -- and she later confesses to Klara her trespass.

The extended sequence -- the half-hearted competition for Elis -- underscores the bonding process between these girls beyond their rhythm section. The tone of the film, in fact, is perfect. Moodysson is adapting a graphic novel by his wife, Coco, and the movie feels like a fond, wistful look back at a quaint era in popular culture. Yet, it doesn't drown in sepia-tone syrup. It is vibrant and fundamentally human. The dialogue is authentic and fresh and direct. The scenes are often funny and touching.

The three girls are all first-time actors. They have been tossed together in a brand new setting. Through sheer spirit and determination, they make a joyful noise together.

Up Next: "Boyhood"

Kids Today: Part 2

IT FELT LIKE LOVE (A-minus)  - When we first see Lila, at the beach, she's wearing an excessive amount of sunscreen (or greasepaint) on her face that has dried into a pale white Kabuki mask. We will study that face for an hour and a half, as the teen tries mightily to be perceived as an experienced woman rather than as a kid. Near the end, she'll literally be wearing a mask during a dance routine (to a racy rap song), and we won't be any closer to seeing the real Lila inside. But we'll know her.

Filmmaker Eliza Hittman, in her feature debut, creates a dreamlike world full of wonder and peril, and everything in between, as we look over Lila's shoulder or stare past her pixie eyelashes into those yearning eyes of hers. Lila (doll-like newcomer Gina Piersanti) spends her days hanging with her sweet-sixteen pal Chiarra, who has a boyfriend and seems to be far more experienced sexually. Chiarra, lean and more overtly flirtatious than Lila, boasts of having slept with three other boys, but her reluctance to go below the belt with Patrick strongly suggests that she's lying about already having lost her virginity. Lila is the third wheel in the summer adventures, which includes breaking into a home near the beach, mainly just for grins, or just hanging out in the surf (it looks like Coney Island).

Lila steals some of Chiarra's one-liners to do some boasting of her own to her neighbor pal, a younger boy. ("He went down on me," she claims about a supposed beach hookup, sounding more confounded than confident. "But he needs practice.") Hittman isn't shy about exploring teenage intimacy, and her camerawork is mesmerizing. It's as if the camera becomes one of the intimates, entwining itself in the clumsy passion. The makeout sessions between Chiarra and Patrick are surprisingly innocent, with a lot of tender kissing and simple stroking of bodies. I don't think I've seen a more boldly intimate (yet nearly chaste) film; it sweeps you up into its swirl of adolescence.

Lila, aching for that human contact, spots an older boy at the beach, Sammy (Ronen Rubinstein, perfectly cast as another Channing Tatum clone), and pursues him. She has barely a clue about how to seduce someone and even less game. She visits him at the gaming center where he works, tries flirting by text and crashes one of his parties with Chiarra. While Lila lacks the wiles of a woman, she's smart and calculating, and she tries to make Sammy think that he passed out after the party and slept with her. As she diligently tries to implant herself in Sammy's world of pot, fellow goons and disposable girls, Lila flirts with danger.

Hittman uses Lila's dog in sometimes obvious ways to parallel the girl's story. The dog is somewhat abused by Lila's uncaring father -- when he forgets to buy dog food, he just lets the pup eat from the garbage -- and I've never seen such an expressive face on an animal (as when Lila is dragging it outside by the collar). Lila clings to the dog like a child does, luring it into bed with her, and we fear that one of them will be harmed in some way. When it comes time for Lila's showdown with Sammy and two of his pals, one of them literally commands her, as if to a dog, to "sit," pushing the boundaries of how far she will let them degrade her. How far will Lila's insecurities take her?

The film builds to a truly terrifying climax. You want to leap into the screen and rescue her from the brutes; hug it out with her and reassure her that this is not the way to grow up. Hittman finds layers in these interactions. She discovers an interesting balance between making the young men ugly thugs but sort of understanding how these simpletons would be tempted to toy with such a willing "seductress."

This is a brilliant debut, rivaling the litany of French filmmakers who have made this subject their hallmark.

Kids today: Part 1

A BIRDER'S GUIDE TO EVERYTHING (B) -  This sweet tale of nerdy birdwatching teens in the Northeast nicely captures the cadences of adolescence.

Newcomers Rob Meyer (who directed) and Luke Matheny show an ear for the interplay between kids at the margins, here the three-person (and dwindling) birdwatching club at the local high school. David (Kodi Smit-McPhee) is still sorting through the death of his mother a year earlier after a long illness (and literally sorting through her stuff) and the fact that his father, Donald (James Le Gros), is about to marry the mom's home-care nurse, sexy Juliana (Daniela Lavender).

On the eve of the wedding, David and his mates set out in pursuit of a mallard duck that David recently spotted, a bird that is thought to be extinct. They kind of steal pal Timmy's cousin's car. (Meyer and Matheny have fun with a side story about the presence in the backseat of a substance that is probably rock candy but is feared to be a stash of drugs.) Timmy (Alex Wolff, "In Treatment") is the wise guy of the group, the braggart, insufferably intent on getting laid. Peter (Michael Chen) is the organizer (their meetings, and even some of their casual interactions, adhere quaintly to Robert's Rules of Order) and resident asthmatic. They are accompanied on their adventure by Ellen (Katie Chang, "The Bling Ring"), a photography student who has access to a decent lens. Ellen is crushy on David, though Timmy tries to work his charms on her. (Unfortunately, Chang is the weak link here; she plays it understated and dull, as if consciously trying to be the opposite of her "Bling Ring" baddie. She comes off here as Ellen Page stripped of personality.)

Smit-McPhee has the cartoonish doe-eyed, puffy-lipped cuteness of a Leif Garrett, while Wolff has the throwback cockiness of the trash-talking Mike Damone from "Fast Times at Ridgemont High." Those whiffs of nostalgia are almost certainly intentional; the filmmakers seem to paying homage to such treasured teen films as "Stand by Me" and "Meatballs," along with perhaps a dash of retro Wes Anderson.

Not everything fully works here. A plot device that requires David to race back to make the wedding is poorly developed. But Smit-McPhee and Le Gros ("Ally McBeal" and the recent "Night Moves") nail the awkwardness between father and son and the elephant in the room. Ben Kingsley has an extended cameo as a local birding expert (who knew David's mom, a published authority in the field, as well) who both advises the kids and competes with them in pursuit of the rare bird. (A scene with another pair of rivals allows the writers to pen some funny bird banter that goes beyond nerdy.)

The filmmakers work within the Disneyfied format to find depth and charm among the teens, and the banter is sharp and winning (and rife with inside baseball). Here's sample dialogue:

ELLEN: I still don't get why you it's called Project Anus.
TIMMY: It's A-nas. ... It's Latin for duck.
ELLEN: You guys speak Latin?
TIMMY: Yeah. (Catching himself) Sometimes.

"A Birder's Guide" is a perfect lightweight summer adventure, a fine bonding story and a welcome break from cynicism and cell phones and superheroes.

BONUS TRACK 
A bird reference is an excuse for the random video of the day, from the band Buffalo Tom:

Soundtrack of Your Life: Walgreens Pharmacy

An occasional feature in which we mark the songs of our relative youth as played over public muzak systems. 

Date: 16 August 2014, 5:28 p.m.
Place: Walgreens Pharmacy queue
Song:  "Never Had Nobody Like You"
Artist: M. Ward
Irony Matrix: 5 out of 10
Comment: A fairly recent song, from this decade, so "relative youth" is relative, but I don't associate the indie darling of the new millennium with drugstore soundtracks. It is an old-fashioned tune. And it did help the time pass and reduce the anxiety of waiting in line for hydroxyzine, of all things. This is the best Walgreens track since the grunge version of Neil Young's "Hey Hey, My My (Out of the Blue)" in the cold-and-flu aisle.

BONUS TRACK
Playing word association to link back to a classic, because we feel like it, here's "Nobody But You," from Lou Reed and John Cale:

Inadvertent Double Feature*

The ever-reliable Philip Baker Hall shows up in his patented supporting role in two movies watched in the past few days: 

CLEAR HISTORY (B+) - Larry David and his stable of writers serve up what is essentially an extended episode of his shtick from "Seinfeld" and "Curb Your Enthusiasm" (the man knows his niche), with an entertaining narrative that holds up over its feature length.

David plays Nathan Flomm (presented without glasses and with a hippie's shoulder length hair and a beard), a cranky PR specialist for a fledgling electric-car company run by Will Haney (the dependable John Hamm), who is naming the car after his son, Howard (a quaint tribute to Edsel Ford?). They have a falling out, and Flomm quits, tries to reconsider, but then is ousted, losing his stake in the company. The car becomes a hit, and Flomm loses out on a billion dollars.

Crushed, Nathan disappears to Martha's Vineyard, and when we see him 10 years later, he finally looks like Larry David, unrecognizable to those who knew the tragic Flomm story. There, as Rolly DaVore, he falls in with a great group of friends and poker pals, played by some fine character actors, including a restrained Danny McBride, Lenny Clarke and bawdy filmmaker Peter Farrelly. Soon Haney shows up, having bought the island's biggest estate, which he begins to turn into a garish monstrosity, to the horror of the locals.

The film is essentially the story of Rolly seeking to exact revenge on the man who cost him a billion dollars. Once the narrative is established, the story unfolds smoothly, propelled by a stellar cast. Amy Ryan (our favorite from "Win Win") plays Rolly's waitress ex-girlfriend and the butt of a very funny running joke about whether she, 20 years earlier as a young woman, went backstage at a concert by the group Chicago and serviced a bunch of the band members (or "Chicagoans" in David's vernacular). Philip Baker Hall is the contractor overseeing the mansion's remodel; he owes a favor to Rolly, giving Rolly access to the place. Rolly then meets and tries to seduce Haney's wife, played by Kate Hudson, who is likeable for the first time ever. Rolly conspires with the island's eccentric, Joe Stumpo (a manic Michael Keaton); Stumpo and his crazy sidekick (Bill Hader) like to blow stuff up (a quaint nod to "SCTV"?). Keaton hams it up like his old self.

The list goes on. J.B. Smoove is back to show off that awkward chemistry he has with David. Eva Mendes plays an ex-fatty whose engagement is sabotaged by Rolly. Liev Schrieber has a memorable turn as Tibor, an ignition salesman from Chechnya.

David finds a fine balance between traditional feature-film storytelling and sitcom farce. He tosses in his patented quirks (annoyance at electrical outlets not being reachable, a fender bender resulting from confusion over a wave goodbye versus a "go ahead" wave). He still has an ear for one-liners (when Rolly storms off after (re)meeting Haney, one of the poker pals shrugs and explains, "His ex-girlfriend blew Chicago"). He uses classic Chicago hits to good effect.

David has assembled his go-to writers and a diverse cast of actors who all dive in head first, seemingly like they had a blast. It has the air of a throwaway project, with a cozy familiarity that goes down smooth. 

BAD WORDS (B) - Make no mistake: This is not a fully realized film. Instead, it's a platform for Jason Bateman to create a memorable comic character and run wild with it.

Bateman is often hilarious, in his understated way, as a 40-year-old who finds a loophole in the rules (he never completed eighth grade) and crashes the annual junior high spelling bee. Bateman plays Guy Trilby, a bitter man on the brink of middle age who has personal reasons for wanting to sabotage the annual spelling contest.

He is not shy about psychologically attacking any of the pre-teen challengers who get in his way. He quickly falls in with perky Chaitanya Chopra (a delightful, bright-eyed Rohan Chand), whose infectious bubbliness ("What's your favorite word, Guy?!") at first annoys Guy but then melts his icy heart. When Chaitanya insists that not all women have nipples, Guy pays a prostitute $10 to flash the awestruck boy for a ten-count.

Guy doesn't have a filter, so he doesn't edit out his foul language, no matter whom he's addressing -- kids, parents, tournament officials. In some ways, this is an extended acting exercise for Bateman. And from his childlike crewcut to his bug-eyed mugging, he disappears into the character. He has fun behaving badly.

Of course, there's a plot needed, and the writers manage to construct something out of cardboard. There's not much to suspense, but the final showdown is clever, and Bateman and Chopra have wonderful chemistry to the very end.

The supporting cast is strong. Baker Hall is the dictatorial founder of the tournament who does color commentary on the telecast. Allison Janney, in an unflattering old-maid wig, is the stuffy head of the tournament who vows to stop Trilby. In a subtle running gag, she badgers the proctor over his pronunciations and diction, even though he seems to speak perfectly fine. Kathryn Hahn is delightful as the blogger who sponsors Trilby and who is physically addicted to him. (Their goofy sex scenes are amusing.) Rachael Harris ("Natural Selection," "The Hangover") makes the most of a minor role as the flustered parent of a contestant.

The production values are a bit sketchy, but Bateman and Chopra are so entertaining that you don't mind. "Bad Words" satisfies as an 89-minute guilty pleasure.

 * - An occasional series. See a previous entry here.

R.I.P., Robin Williams

The Hemingway reference stings a bit today, but for dark-comic genius, this late-career turn is a gem:




What the hell, one more, from the gallows:

New to the Queue

A summer drought lingers*:

Wallace Shawn teams with Jonathan Demme to film an Ibsen play, "A Master Builder."

A Norwegian view of the eternally adolescent grown man, "The Almost Man."

Alex Gibney has been hit-and-miss with his documentaries, but we're interested in his take on the Nigerian singing star, "Finding Fela."

A doc following the live of three poor teenage boys in Missouri, "Rich Hill."

An odd little drama out of Berlin, "The Strange Little Cat."

A documentary about  the inspiration behind "Dog Day Afternoon," John Wojtowicz, "The Dog."

A portrait of the Iranian artist Bahman Mohassess, "Fifi Howls From Happiness."

* - In the July 18 and 25 issues of the New York Times Weekend section, we found zero movies, out of a couple dozen reviewed, worth adding to the queue. A rare example of back-to-back shut-outs.

That '70s Drift

A pair of documentaries recalling that depressing era of yesteryear:

THE BATTERED BASTARDS OF BASEBALL (B-minus) - Not the finest technical achievement (by far), but somewhat of a must-see for baseball fans, especially those who came of age during the DH/Free Agent era.

Actor Kurt Russell's dad, Bing, was a fading TV supporting player (he had a recurring role on "Bonanza" for 13 years) when he decided to step in after the Portland Beavers Triple-A club left town. Bing set up the independent Portland Mavericks, the only professional team at the time that was not linked to Major League Baseball's elaborate farm system.

Newcomers Chapman and Maclan Way track down Kurt Russell -- who played for the team between his turns as a child star ("The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes") and his stardom as an unlikely adult action hero ("Escape From New York") -- to wax nostalgic about his big ol' lovable dad and the ragtag group of misfits who made up the A-ball roster. The production values are passable -- the Ways don't try very hard to edit the interviews smoothly, giving them almost a stop-action effect at times, set against plain white backgrounds -- but the story is undeniably appealing. The players took pride in taking on the Major League teams' young bonus babies and giving the upstarts an old-fashioned whipping. (In the Mavericks' very first game, their pitcher twirled a no-hitter.)

This is the team that signed Jim Bouton ("Ball Four") for his comeback. The Mavericks had a left-handed catcher among other quirky castoffs in the twilight of their careers. They set attendance records and came close to winning the Northwest League pennant. They lasted only a few seasons in the mid-'70s, before the big leagues scrambled and brought the Beavers back to Portland to play again in the Triple-A Pacific Coast League.

Even with bargain-basement production values, the documentary exudes a certain charm. The filmmakers do their homework, tracking town old newspaper clips (and the beat writers who generated them) and extensive footage from grainy home movies (some of which seem enhanced to make them seem folksier). In one effective scene, the Ways simply let the archival film show the highlights of the final inning of a championship game, sans narration, revealing the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat. They borrow footage from Joe Garagiola's weekly baseball show, in which Garagiola was so enamored of the Mavericks that he devoted two episodes to the team and its fans.

At a snappy 73 minutes, this one goes down easy.

NOTE: This is a Netflix exclusive, available for streaming.

NIXON BY NIXON: IN IS OWN WORDS (B) - As the 40th anniversary of Richard Nixon's resignation approaches, HBO marks the occasion with a detailed review of his White House tapes, letting the man once again hang himself with his own words.

No matter how many times I've heard snippets of the tapes created in the White House between 1971 and 1973, I find excerpts fascinating. This film goes beyond the greatest hits and digs deeper into the archive (the entirety of which has now been released) and scoops out nuggets that many folks have probably not heard before. We listen in on personal calls from wife Pat Nixon and the first daughters, one of whom goes on giddily (Gidgetly?) about the new TV/stereo system that has been set up in one of the rooms (it has a cassette deck!!).

We hear the president, apparently on the fly, warm to the idea of approving Secret Service protection for Edward Kennedy during the 1972 primary season as an opportunity to spy on his arch-enemy and possibly ruin Kennedy for 1976. Nixon goes on, of course, about "kikes" and "fags" among his many other racist, misogynist and vulgar rantings. Jews are natural spies, he warns. Homosexuality is an abomination in his eyes, though his beliefs come off as a bit more nuanced; he says he "understands" that homosexuality is going to happen, but he is chagrined that we as a culture have to hear about it let alone respect or accept it. Newsmen are worse, in his view; he threatens press secretary Ron Ziegler with his job if he dares let anyone from the Washington Post set foot in the White House.

Curator Peter Kunhardt ("Finding Your Roots with Henry Louis Gates Jr.") stays out of the way here, letting his subject's despicable personality unfold before the viewer. (The recordings are presented in chronological order.) The director uses simple, snappy graphics to provide the setting for each conversation and onscreen text to enhance the audio and explain the context of the dialogue. He lets the tape unspool, revealing a typical underhanded policy decision and then invariably follows it up with a press conference or speech to the nation in which Nixon states the opposite, in a continuous stream of blatant lies to the American people.

The viewer might even generate an ounce of sympathy for Henry Kissinger, whose penchant for talking to the leading columnists of the day leads to the bugging of not only Kissinger's office phone but also his home line. Nixon comes off like a mob boss, using the FBI or the IRS as his private street crew, siccing his minions on anyone who crosses him.

We've heard much of this audio before, and we all know this story inside and out, but this package stands out as a revealing snapshot of the man and of an era. This film doesn't run for much longer than an hour, but it's a fresh reminder of the megalomania inside the White House that struck at the very heart of our constitutional system. Kunhardt's presentation is smart and entertaining.

NOTE: This is debuting this month exclusively on HBO.

Hot Summer Nights: Vol. 2

The rest of the Guild Cinema's noir fest, as Fritz Lang and Dana Andrews save the day:

WHILE THE CITY SLEEPS (1956) (A-minus) - The best of the fest, this sizzling Fritz Lang comic potboiler with a great cast is also one of the best journalism movies I've ever seen.

Dana Andrews is newsman Edward Mobley, a front-page byliner, columnist and TV news host. He's caught in the competition among three senior editors for the top spot at the Kyne wire service and accompanying newspaper and telecast. The three are chasing the story of the Lipstick Murderer as they vie for the favor of the son of the founder after the elder Kyne dies. The son, Walter, is portrayed as a clueless playboy by Vincent Price. Wire service director Mark Loving (the always-reliable George Sanders) has the inside track. But don't rule out the newspaper side's gruff editor John Day Griffith (Thomas Mitchell, who was Uncle Billy in "It's a Wonderful Life"), who has a gleam in his eye and makes the best use of Mobley, who has an inside source with the police, Lt. Kaufman (the suave Howard Duff, my mom's old favorite). Picture editor Harry Kritzer takes the least-circuitous route: sleeping with Kyne's wife (the voluptuous Rhonda Fleming).

The crazy-eyed killer, who we know from the opening scene, is Robert Manners (an unnerving John Drew Barrymore), who likes to leave clues to the police and who is not very nice to his poor old mother. Cute Sally Forrest is Mobley's fiancee, Nancy, a perky blonde who knows she won't ever tame the lovable drunkard of a newshound. That's quite a set of players. But topping them all is Ida Lupino ("High Sierra") as the wisecracking knockout Mildred Donner, the paper's gossipy "women's columnist." She's got her claws in just about every man in the newsroom, and she particularly knows how to push Mobley's buttons (try alcohol first). Lupino is both the glue that holds this scene together and the force of nature that threatens to rip it all apart.

The dialogue has a Billy Wilder snap to it throughout, landing easy on the modern ear. This was journeyman studio screenwriter Casey Robinson's final screenplay before retirement, and it's a good bet that it was his finest hour. The battle of the sexes comes off as both racy and classy. Robinson has a good eye and ear for the news game as well as the repartee between the players. He also pegs the killer as a disaffected young man corrupted by the scandalous influence of ... comic books! (Obviously, the Grand Theft Auto of their day.) Here's a sample of the script:

Mobley: You know, you have very nice legs.
Nancy: Aren't you sweet.
Mobley: Nice stockings too. What holds your stockings up?
Nancy: There's a lot your mother should have told you.
Mobley: I didn't ask my mother. I asked you.

And then  there is this one horrifying line, from the newsroom: "Don't give it to the copy desk; ship it directly to the wires." Sure it's old-fashioned, but the movie gets the newsroom scenes right on. (As well as the after-deadline saloon scenes.)

This reminded me of one of Wilder's best, the ribald journalism classic "Ace in the Hole." The actors are at the top of their game, the complicated plot unfolds perfectly and the pacing keeps you pinned to your seat.

(This one doesn't appear on Netflix; it's available for $10 on Amazon.)

BEYOND A REASONABLE DOUBT (1956) (B) - A great idea for a film. To raise awareness about the unfairness of the death penalty, a novelist looking for a good hook for his second book conspires with his future father-in-law to plant evidence to make it look like he's the killer of a woman whose body was found a few days earlier. They will lure the greedy DA into an overzealous prosecution (like in the opening scene of the railroading of another suspect based on circumstantial evidence), get sentenced to death row and then -- ta-da! -- reveal that it was all a set-up (and here are the photographs and the word of the father-in-law as proof). 

What could possibly go wrong?

The writer, Douglas Morrow, went from sketching out sports biopics to this and then straight to series television, penning mostly one-off episodes in the 1960s. Here he's got a decent cast, with Dana Andrews carrying the load as the novelist, Tom, and Sidney Blackmer as his accomplice. Joan Fontaine hams it up as the fiancee who stands by her man even though he's left her in the dark about his crazy scheme.

So what does go wrong? I figured something would, but I wouldn't have guessed the clever twist that Morrow came up with. I should say "twists." The plot gets turned a second and then a third time in that last reel, each one juicy and just believable enough.

Clocking in at a succinct 80 minutes, this is compact and entertaining storytelling.

THE LOCKET (1946) (C+) -  This little oddity tries to be quirky and mysterious, but it's mostly just confounding.

Lovely Nancy is a sight to behold on her wedding day, wearing a lovely locket. But a stranger appears and takes the groom aside to tell him about Nancy's past. We flash back to a therapy session where Robert Mitchum shows up to tell the first stranger about his own past with Nancy. In that flashback, Mitchum and Nancy are lovebirds. And then Nancy spins a story in flashback to her childhood.

The mind reels. The Russian-doll nesting must have seemed clever on paper. On screen it's annoying. And the mystery behind Nancy's fascination with jewelry isn't very compelling. Nor are the secrets that reveal her to be less than a virtuous woman.

Laraine Day gives it her all, and Mitchum is the right level of creepy. But this one never takes off.

NOTE: It was a disappointing 10-day run this year. All selections came from the Warner archive, curated by a national figure. All were presented, as well, as digital transfers. No more locally chosen obscurities on original film prints, rattling and sputtering through the projector. Progress.